Читать онлайн «White Walls: Collected Stories»

Tatyana Tolstaya

WHITE WALLS

Collected Stories

^{Translated by}

^{Antonina W. Bouis}

^{Jamey Gambrell}

LOVES ME, LOVES ME NOT

“The other kids get to go out by themselves, but we have to go with Maryvanna!”

“When you get to be seven, you’ll get to go out alone. And you don’t say ‘disgusting’ about an elderly person. You should be grateful to Maria Ivanovna for spending time with you. ”

“She doesn’t watch us on purpose! And we’re going to get run over, I know we are! And in the park she talks to all the old women and complains about us. And she says: ‘spirit of contradiction. ’”

“But you really do your best to spite her, don’t you?”

“And I’ll go on doing it! I’m going to tell all those stupid old women ‘how don’t you do’ and ‘bad-bye. ’”

“Shame on you! You must have respect for your elders! Don’t be rude, listen to what they say: they’re older and know more than you. ”

“I do listen! All Maryvanna talks about is her uncle. ”

“And what does she say about him?”

“That he hanged himself because he had a bad bladder. And that before that he was run over by the wheel of fortune. Because he was in debt and had crossed the street improperly. ”

…Small, heavyset, and short of breath, Maryvanna hates us and we hate her. We hate the hat with a veil, the holey glove, the dried pieces of “sand cookies” she feeds to the pigeons, and we stamp our feet at those pigeons to scare them off. Maryvanna takes us out every day for four hours, reads books to us, and tries to converse in French—basically, that’s what she is hired for. Because our own dear beloved Nanny Grusha, who lives with us, doesn’t know any foreign languages, and doesn’t go outside anymore, and has trouble getting around. Pushkin loved her very much, too, and wrote about her and called her “my ancient dove. ” And he didn’t write anything about Maryvanna. And if he had, he’d have written “my fat piggy. ”

But what’s amazing—absolutely impossible to imagine—is that Maryvanna was the beloved nanny of a now grownup girl.

And Maryvanna brings up that girl, Katya, every day. She didn’t stick out her tongue, didn’t pick her nose, ate everything on her plate, and hugged and kissed Maryvanna—she was crazy.

At night, in bed, my sister and I make up conversations between Maryvanna and the obedient Katya.

“Finish up the worms, dear Katya. ”

“With pleasure, sweet Maryvanna. ”

“Eat a marinated frog, child. ”

“I already have. Please give me some more mashed mice. ”

In the park that Maryvanna called “the boulevard,” pale Leningrad girls dig in the darkened autumn sand, listening to adults talk. Maryvanna, quickly making the acquaintance of some old lady in a hat, takes out her stiff old photographs: herself and Uncle leaning against a grand piano and behind them a waterfall. Could that white airy creature in lace gloves be buried somewhere in the bowels of that gasping fat? “He was father and mother to me and wanted me to call him simply Georges. He educated me, he brought me out into society. Those pearls—you can’t see them well here—were a gift from him. He loved me madly, madly. See how handsome he is here? And here we’re in Piatigorsk. That’s my friend Yulya. And here we’re having tea in the garden. ”